quantum anomalies
by xxwitchinghour
Summary: When Scott Lang finds himself trapped in the Quantum Realm, it’s up to Ava Starr to find him and... contact the Avengers? There’s just one problem with that-no one knows where the Avengers are, and half the universe just disappeared.
1. 001

Chapter 001

 **[Scott Lang]**

The Quantum Realm was a bittersweet phenomenon, he supposed. Something that surrounded you every second of the day, yet only accessible to few. He wished he did not have access to this horrible place that disguised itself in bright colors and mystery.

Time wasn't a thing in the Quantum Realm either. Scott didn't quite know what went wrong on the 'surface' world. He knew that some of the world's greatest minds were working on getting him out. He hoped Hope was alright. Cassie. God he wished he could hold his little girl one last time before his mind dissolved into nothingness. And Janet. Poor Janet who had just gotten her life back after 3 decades in this place. He didn't know if he could do that. He wasn't as strong as her. Or Ava. Man, there were so many strong people in his life that he didn't know how he was even worth more than a rusty penny to any of them.

Being left down here gave him a lot of time to think. Lots of time to think about actions of consequences. Mostly helping out 'Cap' and then the Raft and then losing Hope. And Hank. Just when he thought his life might just be turning around for the better, Hawkeye shows up to his door and tells him Steve Rogers needs his help. It was almost an exact parallel to his time in prison and the VistaCorp incident, it was funny.

But not really. Because all he had in his funky little ordeal was himself, a canister full of particles that would never reach the person it was meant to heal, and his decomposing brain.

He wondered what it would feel like to talk and eat again.

He had attempted keeping track of time once, too. Keyword being 'attempted.' For some godforsaken reason, nothing was the same up there as it was down here. He got to 367 seconds before he gave up. Between six minutes and infinity. The amount of time passed was somewhere between six minutes and infinity.

Scott dreamt.

Scott drifted.


	2. 002

[Ava Starr]

Ava wakes up cold and alone. It's how she wakes up everyday now, with Bill being gone. She's on the last of the particles the Pym-Van Dynes had gathered for her. She's gotten a little bit better since Janet did whatever she did, but she finds herself phasing more often than not these days.

It had been normal day, with her and Bill were quietly sipping some tea, while waiting for a shipment of particles from Janet. It never came. One moment, he was raising the cup to his lips, the next it was shattering onto the floor.

S.H.I.E.L.D. didn't allow her to be sentimental most of the time, but she hadn't the heart to clean up the shards, the liquid long since evaporated.

Another unlikely sentiment of hers were the Langs. During those first days of getting used to not being an assassin or running for her life, Scott had invited her over one night to (properly) meet his daughter, and she had initially declined.

He hadn't questioned her when she showed up at 1:30 in the morning, a little bloody and worse for wear.

He hadn't a question when she showed up the next day. Or the next. Or when she stayed over more days than she spent at that house in the woods.

Scott and herself had originally been concerned about her sleeping without her chamber, but was quickly solved when he pulled some shrinking and enlarging disks out of storage and asked how good her aim was.

It was probably why she found herself outside the Lang household an hour after what the news was calling the 'Decimation.'

She phased through the door, only to find a pile of ash, a horrified Luis, and a big, ignorant, ant playing the drums. It wasn't hard to guess who had been dusted.

The deduction went something like this: 1) Scott was still out gathering healing particles for her. 2) Luis had been here for some reason. 3) Cassie Lang didn't deserve this.

She repeated it over and over again: Cassie Lang didn't deserve this. Cassie Lang didn't deserve this. Cassie Lang didn't deserve this.

Luis looked at her in utter shock, like he still hadn't had the impact of what had just happened hit him. The TV in the background buzzed with neon lights declaring a 'national state of emergency.'

She spoke first. "We have to find the others." her voice rasped like old papyrus scrolls. Luis nodded his head mutely and carefully stepped around what had once been Cassie Lang.

When they stepped outside to world of quiet chaos, Luis quietly mumbled, "We need to go check his ex-wife's house."

Ava looked up in surprise, as she had assumed he would have wanted to find his best friend first, but then understood when she knew he would have wanted to tell Maggie what had happened.

When they arrived at the annoyingly happy house, they entered with only a knock as warning.

The sight that greeted them was not happy.

Paxton sat on the floor of his living room, grasping at dust.

He, too, sat in a state of shock, much like Luis had.

Ava was used to death. She had killed many, many, people. She knew now that some of them were innocent. But death on this scale? It disgusted even a monster like her.

Meanwhile, Luis and Paxton seemed to exchange a series of nods that conveyed what Paxton had feared. Cassie didn't deserve this.

And for a minute, it seemed as if the world stopped turning.


End file.
